Crossfire War – RAPID FIRE NEWS=TEHRAN – KABUL – ISLAMABAD WATCH – Central Asia Theatre: 8,000 Fighters from Islamic Countries Estimated to be in Afghanistan Fighting Alongside Taliban – Tehran Enables Many Fighters to Enter from Iran – Fighters Moving into Kabul for Major Attack – Fall of India State Government in Kashmir Reduces Delhi’s Hold Over the State – Laser Weapons Could Be Introduced Soon on Iraq Battlefields

Night Watch: HERAT – It is no coincidence, as Tehran’s relations with the West continues to deteriorate, due to the West’s increasing opposition to Iran’s nuclear weapons production, Tehran has decided to increase the activity in the Central Asia theatre on the Afghanistan front. That will of course keep NATO units increasingly busy and virtually eliminate any possibility of the West taking any action directly against Iran. As the Pentagon Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen said last week, “I have two wars already (Iraq-Afghanistan) and I don’t need a third.”

The South Asia Security Trends and News Scan, (a daily newsletter) by retired India Brigadier Rahul Bhonsle, has mentioned in detail the News Report by a Mr. Hamid Mir which stated there are an estimated 8,000 Islamic fighters from other countries, including the West, are fighting alongside the Taliban and they no longer enter through Pakistan, but from Iran, Tajikistan or directly into Kabul on different airlines. This report was recently presented to Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani. Both Islamabad, the initial creator of the Taliban and the Taliban themselves deliberately under report the number of foreign fighters in the country who are motivated by their hatred of the West-NATO occupying Muslims lands and they suspect the West is there to exploit the resources. They are also motivated by a desire to avenge the many civilian deaths caused by irresponsible NATO action.

Civilian deaths has even increased to the point where Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai recently stated the NATO mission, which he eagerly supported at first, has become a disaster. So I suspect his administration in Kabul decided quite some time ago to look the other way as Islamic fighters entered with the same motivation they used to answer the call of the Jihad in Iraq to attack the UK/US occupation. And this could not be done without support from Tehran which has also sent them with the same weapons and tactics Islamic units have been using in Iraq.

Brigadier Bhonsle’s website is www.security-risks.com and it mentions the foreign fighters began to dramatically increase in number during 2007. This matches perfectly Tehran’s timetable for (f)allout war which Iran always intended, mainly against the West, and before it erupts Tehran wants the West’s forces in any regional theatre encompassed by heavy fighting with their military commands in a state of confusion. These fighters from other Islamic countries and the West are well received by angry locals also incensed at the civilian deaths. A lot of the fighters have even married into the Afghan tribes of Kunar, Nuristan, North Waziristan and South Waziristan.

The fighters arrive as tourists and traders directly from Dushanbe (Tajikistan), Baku (Azerbaijan), Istanbul, Dubai, Sharjah (UAE), Delhi and Frankfurt. Many Afghans in Kabul, Karachi, Dubai, and Delhi are working for them as travel agents, a Jihad travel agency network. It is also very easy to make a new Afghan passport for them in very much the same way that during the 1990s a lot of Islamic fighters in the former Yugoslavia were issued Bosnian passports. Two American operators, Adam Gadhan alias Azzam al-Amriki and Abu Ahmed alias Amir Butt are known in the Afghan Kunar province for making travel arrangements for young and educated Muslims from the US, UK, France, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Canada and Australia.

At the same time a well known Taliban leader, Ustad Dawood, is working as a liaison officer to coordinate between these foreign fighters and locals in the Pakitka province. A source close to Dawood mentioned al-Qaeda (Iran) and the Taliban are now slowly moving fighters to areas around Kabul for a major attack on the capital. Some of them have already entered the capital as vendors and shopkeepers to provide their military commanders with intelligence, which makes me wonder if Tehran intends to have them attack several targets at once including embassies similar to the recent explosion targeting India’s Embassy. They are also in a position to track NATO movements.

Dawood has reportedly renewed his contacts with the Northern Alliance and is working with Jalaluddin Haqqani on an alliance between the Taliban-Northern Alliance-Hizb-e-Islami. An independent source stated many experienced and hardened al-Qaeda fighters were entering the country directly from Iraq to Afghanistan via Iran using roads. These units enter from Herat province, on Iran’s border and Balkh province on the border of Tajikistan and they actually enter illegally with no official record of their arrival. NATO is aware of this and has responded by indiscriminately bombing civilian vehicles close to Iran’s border which has increased civilian deaths.

The fighters from Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Egypt, Kuwait, UAE, Qatar, Jordan, Bahrain, Libya, Iraq, Syria, India and Bangladesh prefer provinces in south Afghanistan while fighters from Morocco, Algeria, Chechnya, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Azerbaijan and from the West prefer the east Afghanistan provinces of Kunar, Nuristan, Paktia, Paktika, Khost and Pakistani Tribal Areas. Islamic fighters from Africa are not encouraged to go to Afghanistan but are routed instead to Iraq and Darfur, Sudan.

Bhonsle believes a lot of these fighters will be eventually directed to Kashmir where he mentioned since the collapse of India’s Kashmir State Government Delhi’s hold over the state has been reduced. There is less of a consensus and resolve by political forces, loyal to India, to confront the crisis of increased attacks.

The newsletter also mentioned laser weapons are about to be introduced on the battlefields of Iraq for use against rocket and missile fire. They are called “directed-energy-weapons” and discharge energy beams for destroying targets. They have already been tested against 60 mm mortars. The head of Raytheon’s Directed Energy Systems, Mike Booen, said the new weapons could be adapted as ground, air and sea weapons.

In 1987 the then U.S. Secretary of Defense, Casper Weinberger, stated laser can be used to set cities on fire and that the Soviet Union was testing it somewhere in the Middle East. Weinberger did not say where so I assumed he meant Afghanistan.

Willard Payne is an international affairs analyst who specializes in International Relations. A graduate of Western Illinois University with a concentration in East-West Trade and East-West Industrial Cooperation, he has been providing incisive analysis to NewsBlaze. He is the author of Imagery: The Day Before.